European and UK governments will likely resort to legislation to decrease the commercial property sector’s carbon footprint to meet the 20% target reduction in carbon emissions by 2020, delegates at last week's IPD Environment Briefing were told.
European and UK governments will likely resort to legislation to decrease the commercial property sector’s carbon footprint to meet the 20% target reduction in carbon emissions by 2020, delegates at last week's IPD Environment Briefing were told.
Speaking at the breakfast seminar to mark the launch of the second edition of the IPD Environment Code, Paul McNamara, head of Property Research at Prupim told delegates: 'On the risk of the impending government legislation, at the UK and European level, politicians are frustrated that the "low hanging fruit" in the real estate sector is not being picked.
'They are concerned about not meeting their 20% reduction by 2020 targets unless they redouble their efforts. The natural sector to look at is property. Something is going to happen in property and so our property industry bodies need to engage in earnest in a dialogue with politicians - because if we have policies unilaterally imposed on the industry, there could be unintended consequences.'
Conference chairman Christopher Hedley, managing director at IPD Occupiers said: 'Carbon in particular and sustainability in general are issues we cannot hide away from. We all need to decide what metrics we are going to use to track environmental impact from buildings down each year and every year for the next 40 years.'
